Effect of crime on communities

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Crime in the UK – spread Crime in the UK is spread out around the country In general most crime happens:  In big cities  Close to popular drinking areas  Popular nightspots  Socially deprived areas Edinburgh will be analysed as an example

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Crime in Edinburgh – affluence and crime The top 5 places with most Criminal Percentage crime in Edinburgh are: Area of all incidents Edinburgh  New Town – 5382  Waverly – 4125 New Town 5382 8%  West End – 3678 Waverly 4125 6%  Niddrie – 3254 West End 3678 5%  Wester Hailes – 2234 Niddrie 3254 5% Them alone make up 27% of Wester Hailes 2234 3% all crime in Edinburgh despite being 8% of areas.

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On a map…http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF&msa=0&msid=216604694535668907649.00049d48d6ec4fc108db6

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What does this mean? Crime happens in popular nightspots and drinking areas (New Town, Waverly and West End) Crime happens in areas of social deprivation (Niddrie and Wester Hailes)

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Effects of crime in communities “Crime not only affects economic productivity when victims miss work, but communities also are affected through loss of tourism and retail sales. Even the so-called victimless crimes of prostitution, drug abuse, and gambling have major social consequences. Drug abuse affects worker productivity, uses public funds for drug treatment programs and medical attention, and leads to criminal activity to support the expenses of a drug habit.” “Fear of crime in areas [where crime has happened] steadily increases and the resulting economic and social effects can span out into the surrounding city. Residents become more withdrawn and defensive and less committed to their communities. The very social fibre of the community is weakened.” Law Library - American Law and Legal Information http://law.jrank.org/

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Effects of crime in communities This means that communities that suffer from crime are more likely to continue suffering from crime and its crime rates to increase unless “[they] adopt neighborhood watch programs to revitalize the community or avoid its decay.”  However this is expensive therefore prevention of crime via education programs for young people in criminalised areas is often though to be a better technique.

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However…This does not solve the crime problems in the affluent areas. In Kent “57 plain-clothes officers, sniffer dogs and patrol officers [were] out in force in a crackdown on drug dealing and anti-social behaviour” according to the BBC. In Ipswitch “Work is already underway to combat the tide of crime with a number of projects in place. These include a night-time economy plan, creation of a dedicated night-time police team, taxi marshalling, introduction of a violent crime car and increased police presence over the weekends.” as the Evening Star explained.  However some people are partial to these kinds of approaches as they do not trust the police service themselves. We have already been shown examples of how discriminatory and ineffective police can be.

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Rural vs Urban When people say crime they usually mean urban crime but rural crime must also be considered.

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Useful links A new website launched on the 1st of February this year determining crime street by street in the whole of the UK – http://www.police.uk – has been overloaded since its launch with over 75,000 clicks per minute. It is currently inaccessible due overload.